


She Bid Me Take Love Easy

by FanchonMoreau



Category: The Worst Witch (TV 2017), The Worst Witch - All Media Types
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-23
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2019-01-21 17:09:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12462189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FanchonMoreau/pseuds/FanchonMoreau
Summary: She knows she's disciplined enough to keep the feeling at an arm’s length. She won’t be cowed by a childhood infatuation. She’s stronger than that.A conversation about faerie defense leaves Miss Hardbroom grasping at the edges of her self-control.





	She Bid Me Take Love Easy

**Author's Note:**

> Hecate Hardbroom is the most extra lesbian in the whole world and I love her to tiny little pieces. 
> 
> Content warning for some very mild biting if that's not your scene.
> 
> And there is a veiled but still present reference to (non-sexual) abuse, so tread with care.

Every young witch hears stories about the faeries.

Always be wary of rings of mushrooms, and don’t ever wander an unknown forest at night. There’s evil just underfoot. The faeries will lure you to their realm, entice you with food, dance, laughter, and all sorts of carnal pleasures, and as soon as you indulge, you’ll find that you just can’t leave. And you’ll stay a night. And another. And it can’t hurt, you think, to be gone just a few nights. But when you finally wander out of the ring, dishevelled and aching with bliss, centuries will have passed. Nothing will be as you left it.

A smart witch never tries to navigate a faerie ring alone. Only three witches in recorded history have ever gotten out of a faerie ring they entered alone, and of them, only one is still alive.

No, a smart witch prepares for the faeries. She chooses a fellow witch to accompany her, she makes a list of what she is seeking. Fairy spittle for sobriety potions, fairy hair for truthfulness draught. She calls upon her coven to seek her out should she not return on time. And she practices self-discipline.

So a young Hecate Hardbroom thought she had nothing to fear when she and Miss Cackle set off to meet the faeries. She had just been hired as the Cackle’s Academy potions teacher, and she and Ada desperately needed to restock the school’s supplies. A trip to a faerie ring was a necessary evil. So they made a list of what they needed, planned out their route, and alerted Ada’s coven. They trusted each other. Hecate trusted herself.

But as soon as they were seated for dinner, it all fell apart. She could resist the food, but the faeries knew that food wasn’t her weakness. She was hardly there ten minutes when three half-naked faerie women drifted to her and settled on her lap. They plaited her long hair, strung fragile necklaces of flowers around her neck, smoothed their fingertips over her collarbone. Crept sly hands up her thighs. _Make love with me,_ one golden-haired faerie sighed in her ear. _Let me make you feel as no one has made you feel before._

Thank God for Ada. If Ada hadn’t pulled her out of there, then who knows how long she would have stayed there, unable to even draw breath, completely in the thrall of those beautiful women. They left the faerie ring with everything they needed mere hours after they first set out for it. A successful mission by anyone’s standard.

After, Ada wordlessly made a pot of tea from the chamomile plant she grew in the office. The two of them drank in silence. And then Hecate disappeared to her chambers, locked the heavy door behind her, and took to her bed. There was so much heat trapped in her body, and so many hours spent pleasuring herself but not getting anything like relief. The faeries whispered and snickered in her head.

Eventually, the fever broke. She emerged from her room as collected as ever, and she and Ada never spoke of it.

* * *

“The trouble with faerie defense is that the whole philosophy is backwards,” Pippa says.

They’re picnicking in the huge field just behind Pippa’s school. The grass is overgrown but Hecate doesn’t mind it; Pippa’s convinced her to peel off her stockings and toe off her shoes and it just feels _nice_ , the soft touch of the grass and the wind. It’s late June and blisteringly hot in the sun, but they’ve tucked themselves away in the shade.  Pippa’s made them a lemonade that she’s spiked with vodka and a mild sobriety potion. It will let them become warm and little hazy, but not properly drunk.

There’s faerie spittle in that, Hecate thinks.

“How so?” she asks.

Pippa rolls from her back to her stomach. Hecate tenses. There’s a patch of grass between them but Pippa seems so much closer now. She makes a point not stare at Pippa’s shoulders, the slope of her neck, the freckles dotting her collarbone and cleavage.

“All you hear about is self-discipline,” says Pippa with a huff. She leans forward a bit on her elbow. “But resisting your desires is the wrong way to go about it. If you’re going to a faerie ring, the best way to prepare is to completely indulge yourself. Food, sex, whatever. Because if you’re starved of any of that, the faeries will know.”

Hecate arches an eyebrow in Pippa’s direction. “Is this what you tell your fifteen-year-olds in class?”

Pippa considers her quizzically for a moment, and then smirks. “Did you ever fancy anyone as teenager?”

Hecate flinches. The beginnings of a transference spell are itching in her fingers, and she has to gather all of her resolve to make her body stay put. How would she explain leaving this conversation to Pippa, she asks herself. She grips a clump of grass and thinks, _stay_ , until the impulse passes and her magic recedes.

“I would have told you if I had,” she says. Each word is sharp and deliberate, as if anything less would expose the lie.

“I suppose so,” Pippa concedes, but there’s an undercurrent of doubt in her voice. She pauses a split second before barrelling on. “Anyway, when you’re in love as a teenager, it’s bigger than everything. You’re so magnetized to one person that suddenly everything’s about them, or about how you feel about them. Your time with them is so bright and wonderful that it just feels, I don’t know, more _real_ , so much more real that you can hardly stand to be without them. And you have to keep finding ways to be close to them because if you can’t be, well, you don’t know how dark it can possibly get and you don’t want to find out.”

There’s a retort on Hecate’s tongue, _which one of your awful teenage boyfriends made you feel like that?,_  but she keeps it back just long enough to realize how truly insensitive it would be. It takes a moment for her to fully comprehend what Pippa has confessed: that at some point, things had become dark for her. She can’t imagine her luminous and irrepressible Pippa carrying a deep sorrow, and it fills her with anger, and something desperate that she can’t identify. She daren’t think about it for too long.

Instead she remembers their long nights together, before the broom competition and the resentful silences that followed. Pippa, resting her textbook on Hecate’s stomach and dangling her feet off the bed. Pippa, smeared with mud but still smelling ever so faintly of her perfume, coming back to the dormitory gone one in the morning because she just needed to pick the crowfoot gathered at midnight herself. And Pippa sleeping in Hecate’s bed, because her own bedroom was a whole corridor away and _please, Hiccup, you do that spell and you make the bed so soft._ Waking up hours before her and staying in bed so she could see Pippa stir, and fix her tender gaze on her. And smile.

Bigger than everything. That’s exactly what it felt like.

“How does thinking about that help?” Hecate asks softly.

“It’s something tangible,” Pippa says, suddenly sensible and to-the-point. “If you have something real to desire, it’s much easier to see that what the faeries have to offer is just not enough.”

Hecate represses a shiver as she recalls her own experience with the faeries. She hasn’t visited a ring since that first catastrophic time, which is highly embarrassing. A witch of her calibre should be comfortable enough to get ingredients from the faeries every now and again, with the proper precautions, of course.

Hecate sighs. “If you say so.” She desperately wants to change the subject.

But Pippa doesn’t relent. She stares at her, open and curious, as if willing Hecate to offer her own experience. Hecate can’t bear it. She turns away and takes a long sip of her drink.

It’s finally Pippa who breaks the silence. “I’m due to go to a ring again at the end of the summer. There was _quite_ the accident with some faerie wing dust last term, so we’re out a bit sooner than expected. I usually ask my deputy, but,” she pauses here, catches her bottom lip beneath her teeth. “I was thinking if you were available--”

“What’s wrong with your deputy?” Hecate snaps. The muscles in her shoulders have tightened and she’s sitting bolt-upright on the grass. Wave after wave of nauseating heat crash over her as she pictures all of the ways her control would break. What she could end up doing in front of Pippa, _to_ Pippa…

“Nothing!” Pippa sputters. “I was just hoping--”

“I have a term to plan,” she says pointedly. She’s trying to end this conversation here, but Pippa’s pushing off her elbows and moving to sit up. This is important to her, although Hecate can’t begin to imagine why.

“There’s no reason to get so defensive, Hecate,” Pippa says, exasperated. “I thought it would be a nice way for us to reconnect.”

“Visiting a faerie ring is not a bonding activity,” Hecate hisses. “It’s a dangerous mission that witches need to take extremely seriously.”

Pippa groans and makes a show of rolling her eyes. “Oh, come off it, Hecate. You don’t need to talk to me like I’m one of your students. I can, believe it or not, take it seriously _and_ try to make the best of it. I asked you because I trust you. Don’t you trust me?”

“You trust me but not your deputy?” Hecate asks drily.

“When on Earth did I say that?” Pippa fires back, full of the self-righteous bluster that Hecate remembers from years of hearing Pippa argue with their instructors. “I want to spend time with you. I know you have my back. Why is this a problem?”

Hecate tries to take a steadying breath. What she wouldn’t do for a peacefulness potion, or anything that could keep her from flushing or shaking. “It’s not a _problem_ ,” she bristles.  

“Then come with me!”

“I--” Hecate starts, but she can’t think of a reasonable excuse. She can only stumble through what she’s already said. “You could take your deputy, or someone from your coven, or anyone else, but we don’t need to--”

“But I don’t want anyone else, I just want you!”

As soon as Pippa says it, her eyes widen and she covers her mouth with her hand. Hecate’s still trying to summon up something to say when Pippa scrambles up from where she’s sitting. “Oh, god, I didn’t say that, I can’t possibly have said that,” she mutters to herself. She doesn’t look at or even acknowledge Hecate. As soon as she’s standing, she vanishes.  

Hecate’s too stunned to move. Her mind plays _she wants me she wants me she wants me_ over and over as she tries to understand what just happened.

 _She wants me_. _She’s always wanted me._

 _Don't be absurd,_ Hecate tells herself firmly. It's not her place to make brazen assumptions based on one slip of the tongue. This will just be resolved just as they used to resolve so much when they were younger: Pippa will realize how silly she’s been and return in time. All Hecate can do is wait.

Hecate sighs and watches the wind toss seeds from a nearby patch of dandelions. It’s perfect for plant gathering, this field. After they stopped speaking, Hecate spent long afternoons in fields just like this one, gathering big handfuls of asphodel and dandelion root. She brewed so much anti-infatuation potion that she soon ran out of ways to store it. And that helped enough: it cooled the hot bursts of anger and shame in her gut. It let her sleep dreamlessly at night.

She’s outgrown the potion, now. In the months since they’ve reconciled, she has been able to sit across from Pippa and discuss pedagogy, and spell theory, and even Mildred Hubble and magical inheritance, without letting the warmth that blooms inside her whenever Pippa is near overtake her body or her heart. At most, she blushes, or she spends an overlong moment admiring how Pippa’s eyes spark when she smiles. Once Pippa’s gone, she curses herself for the lapses, but she knows she's disciplined enough to keep the feeling at an arm’s length. She won’t be cowed by a childhood infatuation. She’s stronger than that.

Or she thought she was. Perhaps she’s not strong at all. Just one conversation gone a bit wrong, and suddenly she might as well be a stupid, pining teenager. Or worse, back in that wretched faerie ring.

This shouldn’t be so difficult. It’s just that there’s one thought, burning bright and reckless at the back of her mind, that she can’t will away.

_What if she does want me? What then?_

She could hold Pippa’s hand. She could touch her, and kiss her. She could wake up close to her again. She could make love to her. She could fall asleep next to her at night and start it all again the next morning.

Imagining it overwhelms her, and she’s trembling, now; something deep inside her has cracked wide open. There are spells she can cast to stop the onslaught of images and fantasies, but she realizes, to her horror and elation, that she doesn't want that.

She just wants Pippa.

Hecate does a quick discovery spell, and then snaps her fingers. She finds herself in an area where the field is dry and overgrown with weeds. Pippa is pacing in the yellow grass, and Hecate has to step in front of her to get her attention. “Pipsqueak--”

Pippa stops, but she doesn’t meet Hecate’s eyes. “Please don’t be angry with me,” she says very quietly to the grass. “I just wanted to be friends again. And I think I’ve gone and ruined it.”

“You’ve done no such thing,” Hecate says. She’s surprised at how calm and sure she sounds, even though she feels like her whole heart is going to fall out her mouth. “You could never.”

“I did before,” Pippa says with a bitter chuckle.

“No. I did,” Hecate corrects gently. “I was the one who left you alone at the broomstick competition. And I never properly apologized, and I am so sorry, Pipsqueak. And I… I don’t think I ever told why I did it.”

“I don’t understand. At Cackle’s, you said that--”

“I didn’t tell you the whole truth,” Hecate cuts in. She tries to steel herself for what she has to say next, but she finds that she can’t. All she can do is force the words out. “I didn’t know how I could still be your friend when I wanted you so much.”

Pippa lets out a tiny gasp. She turns away from Hecate, as if looking at her is just too difficult.

Hecate’s chest constricts with fear. She was right, she _knew_ she was right: Pippa doesn't want her in that way. And now she has to cope with these terrible desires she’s no longer sure she can control. She thinks of the faeries, and how they could take advantage of her, how anyone could take advantage of her, should they work how she really feels. Perhaps it’s best that she leave Pippa’s life again, and this time for good.

She’s so lost in her own thoughts that she almost doesn’t notice that Pippa is looking at her again. Pippa is smiling, just slightly, and Hecate can’t help but smile back. The fear is still present, but there’s something else, too: a captivating, enchanting thing that Hecate can’t name.

“I wanted you, too,” Pippa admits. She steps forward, crowding in close. She takes Hecate’s hand. “I didn’t really know until after you’d left. You were all I could think about. I tried burying myself in my studies. I tried dating boys, but I couldn’t will it away.” She shakes her head and laughs. “I just wanted you.”

Hecate flushes. She’s hot and giddy and utterly defenseless against the effect of Pippa’s words. “I still want you,” she chokes out. It’s hardly even a whisper.

But Pippa hears her. She reaches up and cups Hecate’s cheek in her hand. “Thank goodness for that,” she murmurs. And then she leans in and kisses her.

Pippa’s gentle for those first few moments; her lips are soft, her fingers trace delicate patterns on Hecate’s neck and leave tendrils of warmth in their wake. Hecate can’t keep herself from humming into the kiss, and she feels Pippa’s lips curve into a smile.

And then, with no warning, Pippa becomes bold. She throws her arms around Hecate’s neck and pulls their bodies flush together. Hecate has to hold on to Pippa’s hips to keep herself balanced, and she has to open her mouth and deepen the kiss just to keep up with Pippa’s momentum. Their tongues touch, and Hecate’s knees weaken. She feels like she could melt away like a witch in an old children’s story.

The kiss reaches its natural end, but Hecate can’t make herself stop. She leaves soft pecks on Pippa’s lips and traces her hands from Pippa’s hips to her waist and back again.

Eventually, Pippa pulls away. She giggles into the charged space between them and with a teasing little smirk, she casts a spell that undoes Hecate’s tight bun. Her long hair catches the wind and billows around her face.

“There we are,” Pippa says. “Much better.” There’s a roughness in her voice that Hecate has never heard before, and she shudders when she realizes it’s lust.

Hecate looks at the ground. She and Pippa are going to have sex; it’s no longer a question of _if_ but of _when._ The very thought of it leaves her gripping the frayed end of her self-control, desperate to both hang on and let go in equal measures. Her only recourse against her body is to concentrate on something entirely outside of herself. The grass below her-- how tall it is, how green.

It occurs to her then that the grass was yellow when she first arrived on this patch. She glances around and sees that there’s now a small circle of green grass around her and Pippa.

Pippa follows her gaze and smiles when she sees the ring of fresh grass. “Not even the most experienced witches are above a bit of accidental magic, it seems. Especially when emotions run high.”

Hecate feels her eyes go wide. “That hasn’t happened to me in--”

Pippa starts to laugh. “I was talking about me! I thought maybe I’d done it. But it is a full ring, so perhaps there’s a little magic from us both.” She pauses, and Hecate can see that she’s in deep thought, as if she’s reliving a particularly pleasant memory.

“Anyway, I think it’s lovely,” Pippa says, recovering. And then, delicately: “It’s like a faerie ring, just for us.”

Hecate bows her head and tucks a long piece of hair behind her ear. She doesn't want Pippa to see how wide she’s smiling at that little remark. Just for them. They have things that are just theirs again.

Pippa reaches for her hand and Hecate fumbles with Pippa’s fingers until they’re finally laced with hers. Their eyes meet. Pippa beams. Hecate wants to kiss her again, but she just can’t summon up the courage to lean in.

“I think,” Pippa says slowly, “that we should go somewhere a little more private. My chambers, perhaps?”

Hecate nods. Swallows hard. “All right.”

“All right,” Pippa repeats, She takes a step towards Hecate and speaks right into her ear. Each wisp of her breath seems to linger. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes,” Hecate says, without a moment’s hesitation.

Pippa places a hand on Hecate’s hip. “Good,” she whispers. “Lean back.”

Hecate does.

* * *

Pippa’s bedroom is less pink than she expects.

It’s certainly less pink than it was during their school days. The garish magenta that Hecate remembers has been replaced with a soft dusty pink that’s accented with mouldings etched in white and gold. From where Hecate is lying, collapsed on top of Pippa’s luxurious duvet, it’s not entirely unpleasant to look at.

“Is this all right?” Pippa asks from the other side of the bed. Her pink dress is now rucked up over her knees, and she’s cradling the duvet between her legs. Hecate nods tightly, almost imperceptibly.  She can see Pippa’s legs shift together under her dress.

“I hope it’s not too fast,” Pippa continues, inching herself closer to Hecate. She reaches out and curls a stray piece of Hecate’s hair around her finger. “I just--”

“I don’t think thirty years is too fast,” Hecate says in a rush, and then quickly averts her eyes in embarrassment. She doesn’t know when she became so forward, and a twinge of heat races through her.

She looks back at Pippa, who grins at her. “No,” she says, smoothing her knuckles over Hecate’s cheek. “No, not at all. I just don’t want to do anything that you--”

“You’re not.” Hecate rasps, and she feels her face flush and her breathing pick up. “I’m just… I mean… I can’t--”

“Wait a moment longer?” Pippa finishes, and for the first time, Hecate can see that Pippa’s cheeks are pink and her eyes are dark. Hecate nods. “Oh, darling,” Pippa breathes, “neither can I.”

It’s Hecate who moves first, pulling Pippa’s body into hers and bringing their lips together. Pippa winds her arms around Hecate’s waist and brushes her tongue against her mouth, and her kiss moves through Hecate like magic, or what magic feels like when you are a girl and grasping it for the first time. Powerful, intoxicating, and just beyond your comprehension.

Pippa kisses the corner of Hecate’s lips and starts working her way down her neck. Her mouth is so soft and her tongue is so precise and, gods, so _wet_ against Hecate’s skin that she nearly starts to shake in Pippa’s arms.

She feels Pippa smirk against her neck. “That feel good, Hecate?

Hecate lets out a trembling breath and waits for the spike of pleasure to pass. “You know it does,” she drawls, trying to pass it off as a joke.

Pippa laughs, and then quickly rolls them over so she’s on top of Hecate. “I want to make you feel so _good_ ,” she sighs. Their stomachs and thighs are pressed together, and with Pippa’s weight on top of her, Hecate can feel herself sinking into the mattress. It’s soft; Pippa’s used the same softening spell that Hecate used whenever she and Pippa shared a bed, so many years ago now.

Hecate smiles. “I already do.”

Pippa lowers herself down so their bodies are flush. She traces tentative fingers over Hecate’s collarbone. “More than that,” Pippa says quietly. “We were so close, but it never felt like enough to me. And now I want… “

She trails off, but the heat of her stare speaks for her. Her hand moves down and starts caressing Hecate’s stomach, and Hecate can hardly breathe through heavy air between them.

And then Pippa’s leaning in to kiss her again, and it’s too warm and too close and too much, and Hecate has to turn her face away. Pippa immediately pulls back. She sits up and moves to the side so there’s space between them, and she lets Hecate catch her breath.

And then, after a long moment, she asks, “Are you all right?”

Hecate swallows. “It’s not you,” she says quickly. “I just need a… a moment.” She inches her body backwards so she’s leaning fully against Pippa’s many pillows, and she grounds herself in space. Pippa’s nightable, her desk, her pink couch. A few tasteful portraits of Joan of Arc, and a small but very striking painting of Mab, the faerie queen, on her chariot.

The faeries can’t seem to leave her alone, even here. _You’ve gotten what you wanted_ , she wants to scream, _I’ve given in! Now leave me be!_ Yet somehow they are still mocking her.

She slowly turns to Pippa, who is now sitting on her hands near the end of the bed. “I just... I worry,“ Hecate starts, fumbling. Panic rushes through her. She glances up at the portrait of Queen Mab, as if by some absurd magic she has the answer.

“About what?” Pippa presses gently.

The words come to Hecate unbidden. “What if we do this, and we get it all wrong? Or… what if… _I...”_

Pippa crawls right up to her and places a finger on her mouth to shush her. Sadness passes through Pippa’s eyes, just for the briefest moment, before they soften with affection. She reaches out and grazes Hecate’s jaw with her fingertips.

“There’s no wrong,” she says, very quietly.

Hecate looks away. Her own few encounters with women, lapses of judgment at International Witching Conferences, more often than not, have shown her otherwise. To please a woman is a simple thing, and a satisfying one, but to receive pleasure is another matter entirely.

“But,” she stutters out, “what if… you try …  and I don't… or I can’t…” The heat starts to rise in her cheeks, and she turns her terrified gaze to Pippa, hoping she’ll understand what she can't say.

“Have an orgasm?” Pippa finishes easily. Hecate flinches at the word, but nods. “Oh, darling,” Pippa says, exhaling on the edge of a laugh, “that hardly matters.”

Hecate bunches up the duvet tightly in her fists. “Please don’t laugh at me,” she mutters.

“Darling,” Pippa repeats, much deeper this time, trying to soothe. “I’m not. I just don’t think sex is about that, not at all. I want to be close to you. I care about you. And I’ll show you how much, if you’ll let me. Or perhaps not this way, if you don’t want to. Whatever you want, darling.”

Hecate stiffens. She’s caught off-guard by how much she likes hearing Pippa call her _darling_ ; Pippa’s never called her that before, and it makes the shift in their relationship feel real, but safe, too. Natural. She gingerly lets go of the duvet and moves her hand over Pippa’s. “I would very much like to keep going. But perhaps… be patient with me?”

“Absolutely,” Pippa says, quiet but unwavering. “Anything you need.” Then she ducks her head and smiles, and Hecate’s struck by how beautiful she is, and how _kind_. Hecate’s anxieties start to ebb away. She leans in very close and lets her lips linger near Pippa’s before moving in to kiss her.

Pippa makes a small, pleased noise when their lips meet. They just kiss like that, tender and unrushed, for a little while. Pippa breaks a kiss sometimes to laugh softly into the silence of the room, and Hecate’s cheeks ache from the strain of smiling so deeply, and for so long.

Later, she thinks, she’ll be disgusted with her own display of sentiment. But now she can’t find it within herself to care.

In time, the kisses grow hot, and wildly undisciplined. Hecate’s not sure if Pippa pushes her down on the pillows, or if she pulls Pippa on top of her, because she’s far too preoccupied with kissing her to be paying full attention. The way Pippa sucks on her lips, and then parts them with her tongue-- gods, if she had any presence of mind, she’d cast an oxygen spell so it would never have to end.

When Pippa pulls away, Hecate’s bright red and panting. Pippa grins. She runs a careful hand over Hecate’s collarbone and between her breasts, where the black fabric of her dress gives way to thin, serpentine patterns in green satin.  “These robes are so lovely,” she murmurs. “The detail work is so beautiful. And the green suits you. Do you remember the dress I made you wear Beltane Festival in our sixth year? The one I enchanted green?”

“I remember,” Hecate whispers.

Of course she remembers. Pippa took her old black velvet dress with the torn white lace collar and transformed it. Deep green velvet, black tulle petticoat, and a brand new collar--black lace, spider-web thin, spun with delicate gold leaf. Pippa charmed her hair into delicate braids that wound all the way around her head. _Like a crown,_ Pippa had said, _for a queen._

They spent that whole ball in a secluded courtyard, casting spells to ward off any wizards from the visiting school and practicing fire displays in the warm April air. She remembers Pippa’s smile, backlit by their twin magical flames, and most of all she remembers the thrill of making her gasp with wonder and delight.

Pippa’s soft touch brings her back to the present. “That was quite a night,” Pippa says. And then, haltingly, “I think if I… really search myself… something changed for me that night. In how I thought about you, and what you meant to me. How much you meant to me.”

Hecate gazes up at Pippa, bewildered. It hardly seems possible that Pippa felt that deeply about her. And yet Pippa is right here, in bed with her, confessing it.

Hecate moves before she’s fully aware of it: she wraps her arms around Pippa’s back and pulls her in tight. Their bodies feel perfectly aligned. Pippa rests her head against the crook of Hecate’s neck, and her nose brushes Hecate’s collar. She laughs throatily into the fabric.

“May I… take this off?” she asks.

Hecate’s heart starts pounding, and she knows that, close as they are, Pippa can hear it. She remembers, suddenly, a rehearsal of the broomstick display, a flip gone badly wrong, and Pippa’s left nipple slipping out of her swimming costume. Pippa laughed it off exultantly. Hecate pretended she didn’t see.

Hecate slowly begins to move her hand from Pippa’s back to her side, right under the curve of her breast. She suppresses a gasp when she feels the weight and shape of it. “If I may as well?” she asks, voice cracking at the end of the question.

Pippa smiles. She takes Hecate’s hand and guides it to cover her breast. “Yes, you may,” she says.

It takes concentration to complete the spell that will remove Pippa’s dress, more so because she feels the heavy fabric of her own dress dissolving off her skin. Pippa is doing this spell as slow as possible, so Hecate follows her lead. She watches as Pippa’s breasts are revealed to her, as Pippa’s dress gives way to white lace and soft curves. She feels Pippa’s nipple pucker under her palm as the rest of the pink garment melts away. Her eyes cautiously trace Pippa’s stomach, her hips, her legs, the beauty mark at the inside of her thigh that Hecate spent so long just wanting to touch. And between her legs, a pink bit of lace, slightly dark with moisture. Her throat dries up. Her own dress is completely gone.

“Oh, Hecate,” Pippa breathes. “You’re more beautiful than I could have imagined.”

Hecate feels Pippa’s words flutter inside her chest like faeries’ wings. She can’t find a voice to tell Pippa that she, too, is beautiful, more than Hecate can even fathom, so instead she reaches up to Pippa’s bare neck and casts a spell that releases Pippa’s hair from its chignon. She watches, entranced, as it falls to her shoulders.

After a long moment just looking, Hecate slides her hand into Pippa’s loose hair and tugs her down for a kiss. The contact is electrifying, and the noises that Pippa makes against her lips pulse through her body and settle between her legs. Pippa hums into her mouth, and it makes her feel bold. She lifts Pippa’s breast out of her bra and starts massaging it under her hand.

Pippa lets out a surprised groan at the touch, but soon she leans into it. “Take the bra off,” she pants out. Hecate swiftly vanishes it, and then there’s nothing between her hands and Pippa’s skin. She rolls the nipples under her fingertips, pinches them lightly, and revels in Pippa’s answering whimper.

Pippa moves her hips and opens her legs, and somehow her whole body shifts to the side. “Oh _dear,_ ” she chuckles. She tries to move back, and her knee lands artlessly between Hecate’s legs.

Hecate’s eyes shoot open. Pippa smirks and starts rubbing her knee over Hecate’s knickers. The effect is immediate: Hecate lets out a strangled sound and bucks up against Pippa’s knee.

“My, that is _something_ ,” Pippa whispers. Her knee grinds down again, and again. “Oh, I can feel how wet you are. And I want to touch you.”

Hecate holds her breath. This isn’t how she imagined this. In her head, she lavished Pippa with touches and kisses and never asked for anything in return, never had to reckon with the crude reality of her own desire.

But the truth is she _aches._ She’s ached since she let Pippa back into her life. She’s spent hours helping Pippa pick potions ingredients in her garden, watching Pippa’s gentle and able hands pull up plants from the root and not letting herself talk or think or breathe, because she knew, all along she knew what it was she wanted. That she watched those hands and wanted Pippa to touch her so badly. Wanted Pippa inside her so badly.

She catches the eye of Queen Mab on Pippa’s wall. _All right_ , she thinks. _All right_.

Hecate vanishes her bra and knickers and moves Pippa’s hand between her thighs. “You can touch me,” she says.

And Pippa does. She slides a steady finger through Hecate’s damp curls and draws a line right to Hecate’s clit. She makes tight circles and Hecate feels the heady warm build of it, coiling inside her so much faster and stronger than it ever has before.

Pippa’s gazing down at her, smiling warmly. “You’re gorgeous like this,” she murmurs. She moves her finger down from Hecate’s clit to her entrance. “I want to--”

“Please,” Hecate gasps out, not even trying to resist anymore. “ _Pippa_.” Pippa makes a quiet sound of approval and then slips her finger inside. She curls it, starts massaging a certain spot. She finds an easy rhythm, and it’s so good that Hecate throws her head back and keens softly.

“You don’t have to hold back,” Pippa says, as she slips another finger in. Hecate lets out a long breath. She thinks vaguely that it’s embarrassing, how easy it is for Pippa to almost completely undo her. But then Pippa lowers her mouth to her bare breasts and starts to kiss her cleavage, and the thought dissipates. Pippa’s tongue finds a nipple and she licks gently, flicks her tongue back and forth. Hecate lets out a cry that she can’t believe is her own voice.

“That’s it,” Pippa croons into Hecate’s chest. She sucks the other nipple into her mouth, all the while thrusting with her fingers. Hecate wonders if she’s using a spell or if she just knows exactly how to touch her.

Pippa releases Hecate’s nipple and places a reverent kiss on her breastbone. There’s no magic in this, Hecate realizes. It’s just them.

Pippa stills her fingers and withdraws them. She glances up at Hecate with a wildness in her eyes that Hecate’s never seen before.  “I want to use my mouth,” she rasps. “Is that all right?”

Hecate’s heart lurches in her chest. She’s never let another woman do that; she never let anyone get that close. And as much as she trusts Pippa, she’s terrified to disappoint her. She’s still not convinced Pippa won’t come to her senses and see that she’s made a terrible mistake, and kick Hecate out of her bed.

Hecate’s still lost in her thoughts when Pippa breaks the silence. “Hiccup? Is that okay?”

Something warm and fond and familiar swells inside her at the nickname. How many nights did she spend in Pippa’s bed, or Pippa in hers, because they had studied together too late, or one of their cats was ill, or the wrong teacher was on the night watch, or whatever ridiculous reason they invented so they could have an excuse to be close?

_You’ll sleep here tonight, won’t you, Hiccup? You won’t leave me alone..._

She lifts Pippa’s head slightly to meet her eyes. “Okay.”

Pippa leans in to kiss her quickly, and then starts kissing her way down Hecate’s body. She does not waste time. She parts Hecate’s legs and settles there, letting her soft gold hair brush the inside of her thighs. There’s a spell that she murmurs, one that Hecate has used herself now and again, that opens Hecate up fully to Pippa’s waiting mouth.

It’s a strange sensation at first, getting kissed there. But then Pippa licks a long line across her entrance and gods, she melts. The warmth, the wetness, the closeness. Pippa runs her tongue across her clit, and she has no control over the loud whimper that escapes her.

“Pips--” she stutters out, but it collapses into a groan. Pippa’s strokes become firmer and more confident, and Hecate’s hips start thrusting against her mouth. Pippa throws an arm across her stomach to keep her steady.

And then, without warning, she closes her lips around Hecate’s clit. Hecate’s whole body jerks, and the heat that has been rising within her threatens to break. She tries to breathe through it, but then Pippa sucks again, harder. Hecate closes her eyes and thinks that this is Pippa’s perfect pink mouth on her, and her gorgeous smile kissing her, and she can’t hold back any longer.

She comes, and it grips her so hard she feels she might snap in half. Her hips crash into the bed as each wave overtakes her, and every time it seems to abate, there’s another release, and another. It feels like an age until she’s finally spent.

She closes her eyes and steadies her breathing. Pippa’s leaving tiny butterfly kisses on the inside of her thighs, but she feels almost inured to the sensation because she’s just so _relieved._ She can’t really comprehend it but it’s so strong that it's beating inside her, like its own pulse.

“Pippa,” she mutters. “Pipsqueak. Get back up here.”

Pippa pushes herself up and launches herself to the top of the bed. When she lands, Hecate tuts at her dramatics, but she can’t stop herself from running her hand through where Pippa’s hair has spilled across the pillow.

“Did I tire you out?” Hecate asks. She’s trying for dry, but she can hear a soft note of affection creep into her voice.

Pippa rolls to her side and leans up on her elbow. “Hardly,” she smiles. “I could go again right now if you like.”

Hecate scoffs. “Don’t be absurd.”

Pippa reaches out and laces their fingers together. “Oh, Hecate,” she says, and she brings their joined hands to her chest. She kisses their knuckles. “That was the most glorious, erotic thing that’s ever happened in my bed. Why wouldn’t I want to do it again as soon as possible?”

Hecate turns her head and flushes. She slowly starts to become aware of herself: she’s naked and sticky, and the room now smells of her. Pippa’s lips and chin shine when they catch the light. Hecate shudders as an old refrain resurfaces and starts playing in her head: _such a disgusting, selfish girl._ She lets go of Pippa’s hand as her body starts to curl into itself.

Pippa’s smile falters. “Hiccup, hey. Hey.” She moves to tuck a thin strand of hair behind Hecate’s ear, but pulls back when Hecate shies away. “What’s wrong?”

“I…” she starts, but then her throat becomes too thick with unshed tears to get the words out. She swallows. “I want you so much. So much. It’s…” She lowers her gaze as the tears start to fall. “It’s hardly dignified,” she croaks out.  

Pippa leans forward so their foreheads are just barely touching. “If you want me, you have me,” she says, clear and measured, soft and true. “In whatever way you want. For however long you want.” And here she has to pause. She swallows her bottom lip, something that Hecate knows she does when she is nervous. “There is almost nothing I wouldn’t do to do right by you,” she continues, with some effort. “Do you understand?”

Hecate’s eyes search Pippa’s face. This is far from the first time Pippa has tried to reassure her that their friendship, or whatever it was they had, would be a lasting one, but there was always part of her that couldn’t believe that Pippa truly meant what she said. When they were girls, she’d retort that Pippa was a witch but not a seer, and since she didn’t know the future, she couldn’t make any promises about it.

And that’s still true. But she believes Pippa now, in spite of it.

She nods slowly. “I do.”

Pippa’s face breaks into a smile. “Good,” she says. “And darling, _darling_. Of course it’s not dignified. If it were, it wouldn’t be any _fun_.”

Hecate feels her lips quirk up. “And are you… having fun?”

Pippa’s eyes dance wickedly, and Hecate’s cheeks heat at all of the delicious promise they contain. “Am I _ever_ ,” she says. She cocks her head to the side. “Are you not?”

“No, no, I…” Hecate sputters. “I was just thinking that you still have your knickers on.”

Pippa’s eyes grow dark and wide, and she stares at Hecate in astonishment. Hecate tries to look away, but Pippa cups her face in her hand and draws her close. “That won’t do at all, will it?” she says in a gravelly hush. She raises her hand to vanish her knickers away.

“Wait,” Hecate blurts out. She reaches out and grasps Pippa’s wrist. “I want to.”

Hecate lays a shaky hand on Pippa’s stomach. Pippa nods her consent, and Hecate slowly starts to move down her navel and in between her legs. She rubs Pippa tentatively over the pink silk, feeling how her wetness has saturated the fabric.

She could easily use magic, but she finds herself wanting to remove the this last barrier between them without it. In truth, she spent the better part of her late teenage years trying not to imagine what it might be like to touch Pippa like this. Now that it’s come, she wants to savour it.

She shifts Pippa slightly so they’re both on their side and fully facing each other. She ghosts her hands over Pippa’s hips, lets them settle where silk meets skin. Pippa lifts herself off the bed, and Hecate eases the pink silk down her legs until it catches on one of her ankles. Pippa kicks it away.

“Isn’t that--” Pippa starts, but Hecate stops her mouth with a kiss. She pulls their bodies together and traces Pippa’s lips with the tip of her tongue. Their bare skin is touching everywhere now-- breast to hip, ankle to thigh, everything warm and soft between them-- and Hecate can no longer resist snaking her arm down and touching Pippa between her legs.

Pippa breaks the kiss and gasps. “Hecate,” she breathes. “Will you stay with me tonight?”

Hecate brushes her fingers through Pippa’s curls and dips down to finds her clit. She starts a firm rhythm on it. “I will,” she says.

“Tomorrow night?”

Two nights, Hecate thinks. If you stay with the faeries two nights, it means that no one will ever see you again. Hecate closes her eyes and drops her head on Pippa’s shoulder. Pippa’s quaking in her arms and Hecate’s really touching her and perhaps she won’t be the same, after this. She’s stood at the entrance of some enchanted place: on one side, there’s not knowing what it’s like to make love to Pippa Pentangle. And on the other--

Pippa lets out a breathy moan, and Hecate kisses her, swallows the sound. She moves her fingers faster against Pippa’s clit.

“Wait,” Pippa whispers. She pulls back a little.

Hecate removes her hand.  “What?” she asks, terrified that she’s done something wrong.

“I just--” Pippa begins, and then she smiles. “It’s just really you, isn’t it?”  

Hecate smiles back. “It is,” she says. It’s really her, and it’s really Pippa; it’s as obvious and as extraordinary as that. Before she really thinks about it, she swoops in and kisses Pippa’s cheek. She can feel Pippa’s eyelashes flutter closed. “And tomorrow night,” she says, breathless. “I’ll stay tomorrow night as well.”

It occurs to her then that this, being with Pippa, it’s not an enchanted place. It’s just a place that’s _theirs._

Pippa leans in and kisses Hecate, hard and quick. “Good. It will just be us for the weekend. Now, where were we?” She grabs Hecate’s wrist and brings her hand back down between her legs.

Hecate smirks. She moves a finger inside Pippa, and Pippa makes a sweet, delighted sound that Hecate immediately loves. She quickly adds another, and starts thrusting. Soon Pippa is pressing herself close, her hands roaming up and down Hecate’s back and arse.

“Oh, you’ll be the death of me, Hecate Hardbroom,” she mutters, and Hecate chuckles softly as she places small kisses down Pippa’s neck and across her collarbone. She grins to herself as she twists her thumb and flicks it over Pippa’s clit.

Pippa _squeaks._

Hecate does it again. Pippa muffles her cries by biting Hecate’s shoulder, perhaps harder than she intends, and Hecate sucks in a quick breath at the sting. It’s far from unpleasant.

Pippa looks up at her, brow furrowed, ready to apologize, but Hecate kisses her before she can say another word. She reaches out and strokes Pippa’s cheek, and then she carefully angles Pippa’s mouth so that Pippa’s sucking on her lower lip. Pippa whimpers in understanding. She bites Hecate’s lip gently, and then harder.

Something frantic and hungry is released between them. Hecate rolls on top of Pippa and moves her fingers faster, curls them, suddenly desperate to make Pippa come. Pippa pulls her down and bites her lips, and then burrows her face in Hecate’s neck so she can leave love bites there.  

Pippa stops to let out a high-pitched cry, and then she comes with Hecate’s name on her lips. Her muscles grip Hecate’s fingers and Hecate draws it out as long as she dares. Eventually Pippa touches Hecate’s wrist, and Hecate shifts her hand away.

They collapse next to each other. Pippa’s still panting. Hecate is staring at the ceiling and rubbing Pippa’s wetness between her fingers, trying to convince herself that this really happened between them.

“You know,” Pippa says, once she’s caught her breath, “it might be against all of your sensibilities, but I’m rather tempted to stay in bed for the next two days.”

Hecate suppresses a laugh. “You’re incorrigible as ever.”

“Oh, you like it,” Pippa teases. She moves onto her stomach and drapes herself over Hecate. Hecate’s arms clasp her close without a second thought. She kisses Pippa’s temple.

She’ll be here for the rest of today and all of tomorrow. There’s no way to inform Ada of this without telling Ada what’s happened, or at least implying it in some way. It’s not that she doesn’t trust Ada, she does, so much, but telling Ada gives it substance. Puts it out into the world.

Pippa hums contentedly. It calms Hecate, somehow. She thinks idly that she should be more scared about this than she is. Maybe she’ll feel differently tomorrow, or two weeks from now, but for the moment--

A low bell starts to ring in Hecate’s ear. Pippa doesn’t react to sound, and Hecate realizes that it’s an alarm spell that she set for herself back at the beginning of the day, to remind her when to fly home. Gods, this morning feels like a previous century. She stops the spell with a silent incantation, and then she takes a deep breath and looks around the room.

The pink walls now make the space seem peaceful. The last of the afternoon sun is hitting the gold in the wall, and it gives everything a hazy glow. And above it all is Queen Mab, smiling beatifically, looking triumphant.

Hecate meets her eyes, and smiles back.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from W.B. Yeats's poem "Down by the Salley Gardens."


End file.
